Thought Experiment (1): No political parties. No platforms.
I'm working my way through a thought experiment and you may think this is completely bonkers and I appreciate that, but what I'm going for here is an attempt to see if it could work. I think it's easy to dismiss something out of hand, particularly if it's is different or odd. But I'm more curious about, okay, let's entertain the weird idea and see what we can gain from it. So here it is. I was looking at the US political system
Dewuan .
@FryedOreo · 3:46
They politicize the moment because it obviously appeals to their politics and it reinforces why they feel their politics is relevant to this particular scenario. And sadly, that's become an American thing. We do loss of life and active shooter slave 17 people instantly we're thinking of gun control instantly we're thinking of arming the public more. We're thinking of banning AK 47s, AR 15s but we're also thinking we should get bulletproof hoodies for our kids and we're not thinking about the lives that are lost
I have nothing of significance to add here. I just wanted to say that I loved every point that you made. And I was over here going, yes, yes, and yeah, just thank you
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 1:33
I think it's an age old question, but I want to defend your vision, Christina, in terms of what you said about it was kind of crazy when we imagine it's so Sci-Fi of us, but no great revolution ever happened by being timid, by being closed, by not having imagination and creativity. Imagine looking up the moon in the 1920s saying, I'd like to stand on that moon one day
And we do do that in so many different ways that are not toxic or do not hold us back or do not have negative repercussions, et cetera. So I'm with you. Maybe, just maybe, or if we're creating this imaginative space, let's just say, yes, we're going to make it happen
phil spade
@Phil · 3:12
And if we got rid of the political parties that kind of infiltrate and just kind of try to I don't want to say brainwash, but they try to just paint the picture of, hey, you have to think this way or else you're on the other side
And of course, most of what I just said to you is not necessarily what she said. So I don't want to put any words in her mouth, but she was recognizing a difference between the I and the we and she was talking in the realm of politics. So I'll say that. But for the most part, the rest of that, I think, was my interpretation or where my brain went anyway
phil spade
@Phil · 1:05
Music. You know, as I listened to your swell, I kind of had a realization of the extremes, and you mentioned the extremes. And I think that people that hold extreme points of view here are treated much differently today than in the past. And in the past, when I grew up, the primaries really kind of weeded out a lot of extreme candidates. And even if they made it through to congress, the leadership of each political party kind of held these people in check
If both sides are not on the same, let's say, game board or something like that, then it's almost like speaking two different languages or ships passing in the night or what have you, and then this constant competition and the money, and it's just a huge escalating. The visual that comes to mind is a snowball that rolling down the mountain that turns into an avalanche. I don't know how you shift that. I really don't
TJ mclaughlin
@natchril · 4:10
The political parties are not constitutional. There is nothing in the constitution that requires political pardes. And so they're not given an assigned role, and there's nothing to regulate them operate outside of the Constitution and are focused on themselves, and they're focused on becoming dominant. But people seem to look at the parties as if they were the government. But they are certainly not the government. Actually. They disrupt the operation of government. They interfere with the checks and balances and the separation of powers
I don't quite align with this anymore particularly when the party's being taken in this direction or in that direction, et cetera. And so there was a shifting of individuals as members and then the shifting of platforms. Anyway, I'll include the link here with more information for anyone who's interested. But it's really interesting to hear and even to read a little bit at least about how George Washington was against these ideas and where things went
So you could try to get rid of it. The problem is with getting rid of political parties is that a new organization, faction would just rise up to continue the cycle. Again, the cycle will continue. Political parties here in the United States, it's nothing more than another form of tribalism. It's just another way of saying that we are a modern civilization and not an ancient one. This still goes on in places like west Africa
You know, I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, because we've had political parties, tribes for as long as we have in the US. Then trying to remove that is next to impossible. Completely agree with that partially because there's a lot of rewards that people gain out of it from identity to belonging to winning, quote, unquote any sort of neurochemical feedback you might receive, etc
TJ mclaughlin
@natchril · 4:49
Well, you know, the old says the old saying goes truth is the first casualty of war. And that, as we see, pertains to the ongoing conflict between the two political parties, liberal and conservative. And that whole warfare that's going on stifles input, stifles perspective outside that is outside of the political arena. And it's like everything is politics. But you know, politics isn't everything. That saying everything is politics was a famous quote of Mao stone communist and it's good